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MXir <®%Ittte Alive! 

%\\t f&xta&xi 'Jgfotdbttr ^tfrtfyJWeriatn ^Kacr Groups ^efrraktier 





MEMORY MAP 



ADDRESS 



ROUTINES 



Information and Chairmen - 
Note$ 

Input/Output — byAbedKahale 
3 ZX-81 on Sale 

6 Union City Man - Tim Swenon 

7 ZX-96 - Kai Fischer 



Trea$ury 



ADDRESS FILES 

8 Trials & Tribulations - Don Lambert 

10 The Font 

10 True Type Fonts - David Solly 

12 Emulators 

15 The Z88 Source Book 

19 Unclassified Ads 




ZXir QLive Alive! © 
Established 1991 The Timex/Sinclair NorthAmerican User Groups Newsletter 



T/SNUG Information 



We wish to support the following platforms: 
ZX-80/81, TS-1000, Spectrum, TS-2068, Z88 
and QL. If you have any questions about any of 
these fine Sinclairs, contact the: 

Chairman 

Chief Motivator 
Donald S. Lambert 
738 Gunnar Ln. 
Forsyth, IL 62535 
(217) 875-8043 
dslambert@email.msn.com 

V icb-Chai r m is w 

Tape & JLO PD Library 

Luke Perry 
3409 NE 62nd Ave. #187 
Vancouver, WA 98661 
Luke.Perry@twtelecom.com 



Library 

Dave Bennett (HATSUG) 
1275 Timber View Dr. 
Mechanicsburg, PA 17055-9146 
717 732-4374 
dave975@att.net 

QL Hacker's Journal 

Timothy Swenson 
2455 Medallion Dr. 
Union City, CA 94587-1914 
swensontc@geocities.com 



Rod Humphreys (VSUG) 

10984 Collins PL 
Delta, BC V4C 7E6 Canada 
604 583-2819 

QL PD Library 

John Donaldson (CATUG) 
835 Foxwood Cir. 
Geneva, IL 60134-1631 
630 232-6147 
goodolejohn@avenew.com 

AERCO & Z80 Emulator 

Keith Watson 
41634AmberlyDr. 
Mt. Clemens, Ml 48038 

— -GATOK- — 

Bob Swoger (CATUG) 
613 Parkside Cir. 
Streamwood, IL 60107-1647 
630 837-7957 Work 847 576-8068 
cengl 08@email.mot.com 



ZXir QLive Alive! 

Is the newsletter of T/SNUG, the Timex/Sinclair North 
American User Groups, providing news and software sup- 
port to the T/S community in a VO LU M E of four 
newsletters per year, beginning with the Spring (March) 



issue. 



T/SNUG's main goal is to preserve and 
encourage the use of Sinclair computers by 
providing an open forum for the exchange of 

knowledge, building and maintaining of 
software libraries. Providing vendors, repair 

service and members with free ad space. 

It is the user groups and individual subscribers, rather than the 
vendors, that provide the pecuniary support for this newsletter. 
Vendors and developers receive this newsletter free of charge, 
though contribution from vendors and user groups is gratefully 
accepted. Please support our vendors and service providers 

whenever possible. 
If you have a problem or you have solved a problem, please share 

it with the rest of us. No problem will be considered 
unimportant. 

i'Irfltar/Treaiiiirci-/l , ul»lis»ier 

fou can keep T/SNUG alive by an annual contribution of 
$12 for one VOLUME made payable to Abed Kahaie. 

Send check to. - 

ABED KAHALE 
432 WEST OAKS TRL 
WOODSTOCK GA 30188-7358 
Back copies are available for $1.00 each postpaid. 

Article CwtfrifiiitiiHi^ 

Send in your articles and inputs by disk, hardcopy mail, or e-mail to: — 

Abed Kahaie 

E-mail: AKahale@compuserve.com 

::"£D[ CZ3^ £3 

□ r n o l j 

http://users.aoi.com^iubbbs/tsnug/ 
http://www. outlawrtet. com/~j boatno4 
http.7/www.unixviile. com/2060 
ql-users@nvg.ntnu.no 



H 



<As of September 29, 2001, we have a balance of $497 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



Autumn 2001 



Input/ Output 



Sinclair ZX81 computers 
back on sale 

TlMEx/SlNCLAIR ZX~81 REAPPEARS 

ON THE PERSONAL COMPUTING SCENE 

An obsolete British home computer, the 
Timex/Sinclair ZX81, has made an unexpected 
and daring reappearance onto the personal 
computing scene, thanks to a retro computer 
reseller in the US. 

The unique piece of computer nostalgia, 
created by English computing pioneer Sir Clive 
Sinclair and first marketed in 1981, heralded the 
beginning of a new era by establishing a place 
for computers in the home. 

The ZX81 may have difficulties competing 
with the latest computer hardware, however. The 
machine features a modest Z80 processor 
rurniing at 3.25 MHz with just IK of RAM and 
8K ROM as standard. 

New York firm Zebra Systems has a 
warehouse full of Timex/Sinclair ZX81s and 
claims that the computers are proving a hit not 
just with nostalgic gadget geeks. The computers 
apparently still have a practical purpose in the 
high-tech world of modern computing. The 
company's home page boasts an endorsement 
from one Nasa engineer: "Send me four more 
kits, I'm using them as controllers for a project." 

The Sinclair ZX81 costs $99 (£68 - roughly 
the same as they did in 1981) but are sadly not 
available outside the US. 

11:18 Friday 6th October 2000 
Will Knight 
www.ZDNet.co.UK 

Peter Liebert wrote a very nice thank you note to me 
and stated the way he and his friends were going to use 
Z88 and the supporting materials. That's what I wanted- 
somebody to use it. 

Joan Kealy 

hjkealy@hilconet.eom 

Abed, 

I will be exhibiting my Sinclair collection at Hie 5th 
Vintage Computer Festival in San Jose in September. 
Because I'm on the list to exhibit, the VCF folks appointed 
to me when a reporter from a local newspaper wanted a 



local angle on the VCF. So this past Sunday, there was a 
nice article (with picture) of me and my collection. I 
deleted the article off of their web page, so I can send it 
along if you like. 

Tim Swenson 

swensont@lanset.com 

Abed, 

I .got on ZDnet UK, otherwise known as 
www.zdnetco.uk and discovered Rupert Goodwins' 
Diary. He has several chunks of his diary available from 
1999 and 2000. I haven't found anything for 2001 but I 
would like to direct your attention to his diary for 
26/10/1999 and 6 Oct 2000. In the first, he teEs how he 
became enchanted with the ZX-8 1 and Spectrum and in the 
second, he tells us that (as of last year) ZX-8 Is are still 
being sold by Zebra Systems! 

All I had to do was a search on ZDnet, then on 
Sinclair. Try it; he writes as only a Britisher writes. 

John Donaldson 
goodolejohn@avenew.c om 

"Dear Mr. Lambert: 

About a year ago I read a reference in ZQA! to a 
"TXROM" for the Sinclair ZX-interface-1. This would 
make it work in "Timex mode" without a Spectrum 
emulator. Please tell me how to get one of these. Thank 
you, 

Leon Howell 

Where do I get more ZX 
Mlcrodrlves? 

Abed," 

I wrote and told Mr. Howell that I don't know 
anything about the TX-ROM. I also don't know where to 
get the mircrodrives ( I believe he refers to the tape 
cartridges.). I also referred him to Jack Boatwright since 
Leon is in Bend Oregon. 

Abed for your information I scanned all the issues of 
ZQA! that I have and found a request for information by 
Leon in the Autumn 2000 issue on page 4. 
Timex Sinclair still lives. 

Don Lambert 
dslamber@email.msn.com 

Back again Abed, 

About Leon's question: is it possible that he has a 
Portuguese computer? From reading his letter in 2000 
issue it isn't stuff that you would find on a true US T/S 
2068. He really didn't give too much information. The 
twister board is a clue that it isn't what we used. That and a 
Timex Disk system. 

Timex never got a disk system into the US that I 
know of. Or is it a. Spectrum? 

Don 

I received and replied to the same request from Mr. 



ZXir QLive Alive? 



Autumn 2001 



Howell. I did search the Input/Output pages but to no 
avail. So here is his request again. Abed 

Anyone?? 

I have a ZX-lnterf ace-1 and one 
Microdrive. Where can I get a TX 
ROM to use it in die Timex modeP 

(I don't want one of those dual ROMs with 
Spectrum and TX modes) 

Will it work with Timex disk 
system? I would like to be able 
to copy a Hie from any disk, mdv 
or sop to any other disk, mdv or 
scp with a single command line. 

Leon Howell 
61 50 Monument Dr. #2 
Grants Pass, OR 97 526 

Abed, ~ " ~ 

I've returned to work after 8 months off rehabbing 
(sp) my shoulder as the last repair of my 12 foot fall last 
Nov. I'm currently in the midst of gathering preliminary 
info to purchase the only gas station in our little burg of 
351 people. I've received no requests for hdw/sw from the 
Iowa warehouse since your last issue. Hope this rinds you 
in good health. 

J. Shepard 

jshepard@wccta.net 

Hey Abed my good friend ! ! ! ! 

I was a former subscriber of your T/SNUG magazine 
or publication, how much does it cost to subscribe, I would 
like to join once more. 

Hey, I am considering starting a Sinclair Magazine 
myself too. It will include all Sinclair brand name 
computers, and will have 1 0 double sided pages. 

I'm trying to restart a full fledged Sinclair magazine 
like there once was a long time ago. 

It will focus on hardware & software issues and the 
hardware projects will use the latest new technologies and 
chips to improve the performance of the ZX81. 

Please let your subscribers know about my idea and 
please e-mail me the price to subscribe to T/SNUG. 

Jose Moreno 

Jose55@bellsouth.net 

Hello Mr. Kahale, 

I was surfing the Internet today and decided to type 
TS2068 into Yahoo! 

Search to see if there was any information online. Wow, 
what a surprise I got!! There's more interest than I 
thoughtf 

I started out with a ZX81 way back in the '80's and 



then moved up to a TS2068 when it came out I still have 
the ZX81 although it doesn't seem to be operational 
anymore; I'm not sure what's wrong with it However, my 
TS2068 looks as good as the day I took it out of the box. 
Around 1988/89 1 bought a 3.5" disc drive for it as well. 

I'm amazed at the continued interest in these 
computers! ! I haven't used my TS2068 in a few years, but 
I think I'll get it out again and have at itf ! I 

I loved this computer and spent many hours writing 
programs back in the '80's. It's great to see that ifs still 
alive! 

Jeff 

millward@telusplanet .net 

Dear Mr. Kahale, 

I was interested to see your note on the QL-users' list. 
Is the "ZXir QLive Alive" generally available to users of 
the QL? If so, please may I be put on the circulation list? 

Yours feithfully, 
Paul L. Harris 
2 Tippet? s Close, Enfield, 
Middlesex, EN2-0QR U.K. 

frsl5@frsl5.f9.co.uk 

Hi Abed, ' 

You will find a renovated start page of 

http://www.zx8 1 .de 

and then Mow the link to ZX-TEAM-MAGAZIN . Enjoy 
Peter LJebert-Adett 

P.Liebert@t-online.de 

I've multi addressed this to help my response time 
since it seems I may have dropped the ball way back in '99 
for Mr. Burrell. I can only hope not. Anyway, in 
response to a request of info on the warehouse to Mr. Leon 
Howell, I was going to refer him to the T/SNUG web page, 
hi doing so, I found that the ZXir QLive Alive! issue 
gained by clicking (as suggested) on the nice picture of 
Abed's is the Spring '99 issue. (Why not current?) What is 
embarrassing to me is Mr. Burrell asking the editor about 
his plight of having blown his SCLD and Abed suggesting 
that Jay Shepard could perhaps take care of that. I don't 
remember Jeff ever requesting a 2068 from me. Did you 
get one Jeff? If not, I have plenty! I sorry this is sooo late. 

On another aspect of the web page: 1) how do I 
update my email address, since Abed shows my current in 
ZQA 1 just thought it would be on the site, I guess 1 should 
have told the webmaster. Who is that? 2) shouldn't the 
site be advertising Jack and my warehouse stuff? One of 
the links'? Having a good rainy, but cooler Labor Day, 

J Shepard 
jshepar d @wcc ta.net 

On 



i 



I decided to resurrect my TS2068 with the Zip drive. Hie 
setup with the LarKen Drive will have to wait till I re- 
master my earlier version. Believe me, after over 5 years 
of playing Idiot's Delight mousing around with a Graphic 
Interface, my idiocy was virtually complete. Not only was 
a keyboard difficult, but I could not remember how one 
started up with the disk drive blaring away. 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



Autumn 2001 



Happy Birthday 

The TS2068 did not fail me. The picture came up in 
color bright as ever. You remember that the same vintage 
Apple II had no color, no sound, no on -screen editor as 
you wrote your Basic program?? No blinking question 
mark; you just attempted to run the program; it would not 
run, you searched with no clue and certainly no hint from 
the Apple II. This was a time before the ascendancy of 
Microsoft. 

TS2068 did not fail me but my memory did. I had to 
blunder about trying to remember how one got through the 
4 layers of meaning for every key, holding down this one, 
then that combination of shifts, caps, symbol shift. None 
of it came back to me at a rate that would discourage a 
diagnosis of Alzheimer's. Me, not the Tessie — it was 
astonishingly agile for a machine that dated from what- 
1984? Probably '83. You recall how we can't get our 
iMacs out of the box before the color is obsolete and 
disgracing our desktops? The feeling was not that my 
iMac was blowing this machine away. Lordy, I do wish 
someone had written an emulator for TS2068 to Apple 
Macs. A Spectrum, yes, but the Spec was never even a 
feeble cousin to the Tessie2068. 

After turning off and on repeatedly because I could 
not recall how to go back to the disk catalog, I finally 
dazzled myself with perspicacity and said, "Ah! Ha!, 
"Start" program, listed that out and realized a "LOAD * 
"Start" would do it. Of course, part of the problem is that 
the procedures learned for tape loaded programs, Zip 
driven programs, and LarKen driven programs were 
different. Hey, can you recall when we kept 3 different 
sets of procedures in our heads at once instead of mousing 
an arrow at what we wanted to open next? One-handed 
no-brainer. 

Can you remember when we wrote programs for 
whatever we wanted to do — whether it be playing music 
with chords in a host of different octaves, or making up a 
program to average grades, weight tests, and following the 
school district's exact formula for the 6 week grade? The 
school brass thought I was a "hacker" back when that 
meant aging whiz kid instead of intruder. 

I played several games and listened to music. This 
was one very advanced little computer at its debut. You 
recall TS and a host of small computer manufacturers were 
seared out of the field by a PC JR.? That piece of crud? 
Gone in a year never to be resurrected. We have kept our 
little orphan computers going nearing 20 years now. 

Remember first you have to plug it in. 

Joan Kealy 
hjkealy@rionet.org 

John; 

If I am not mistaken, you did indeed help me. I 
purchased a TS2068 from you (the RE modulator is inop, 
but I prefer a composite monitor anyway). Both Abed and 
you were most helpful in this matter. 

JerTBurreU 
JBurrell@endocardial. com 



I really would like to support your work with an 
article. Please tell me what you think, ZQA! readers would 
like to read about our activities from this side of the ocean. 

Perhaps you will find some questions to ask me, 
when you look at ZX-TEAM-homepage: 
http://www.zx8 1 .de 

Kai has prepared several pages about ZX96" in English 
language and I have uploaded some very short English 
summaries of ZX-TEAM-MAGAZINe 

http://home.t-onlme.de/home/p.Hebert/magazine.htm 

Peter 

I recently dusted off my 1988 Z88 that was originally 
used as -a laptop to bring information to my Mac Plus 
desktop. I want to use it again with my Mac PBG3 laptop. 
But, I find that OS 8.6 and perhaps a single serial port for 
both printer and external modem have conspired to make 
the 1988 software version 1.1 of Z88 to Mac obsolete! 

It still works on a Mac PB 1 45 or 190 with OS 7Gx 
but I am not sure if the OS 7.5, 8.0, 8.5 or 8.6 can work 
with it. If not, or if the hardware is the problem, do you 
know of a fix? Regards, 

Dick Tryon in Frankfort, MI 
rtryon@bignetnorfli.ne t 

I have had the Mac-Spec emulator~I want a TS2068 
to Mac emulator. Also had ZX Loader. As I stated, my 
affection for Spectrum is minimal. I decided that was not 
worth the space on my Mac. But you are kind to try to 
help. Now write a TS2068 to Mac, please. I wonder if 
there is anyone in our organization that could?? 

The UK people liked the Spectrum, but it was no 
where near half as good as the Timex Sinclair 2068. I had 
just about everything worthy from Europe on my LarKen 
or Zip drives with Spectrum emulator-it would have been 
about 1 disk full. 

I am still mad at IBM for bringing out the PC Jr. like 
it was going to be so great. All it did was kill other 
American small computer companies. They should not 
have cut and run, but IBM was such a monster before 
Microsoft cut in. 

Joan 

Hi all 

Thanks for the effort. I did not intend to say that I 
have a Mac Pluswith OS8.6! That OS is on the PBG3 
with just one serial port for both modem and printer. I 
suspect that the OS knows that but the Z88 to Mac 
application does not! So, the app runs on a PB 145 with 
OS 7. 1, but not on the PBG3 with OS 8.6. How can I do it 
is the question. Right now I can use the PBI45 as an 
interim step, but that is slow and tedious. Regards, 

Dick 

Abed, 

I have OS 8.5.1 on my 6100. 1 find that it works fine 
with Maclink version 1.0. 1 have the cable plugged into the 
modem port. It could be that it does not work with Mac OS 
8.6. Or there could be a problem using a single serial port. 
It may need a different cable. 

Dave Bennett 
dave975@att.net 
Dave Bennetts reply below sounds very plausible. 
I suggest that you first try to clean all connectors or replace 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



5 



Autumn 2001 



the cables as he suggests. 

Another way would be to plug and un-plug the cables 
several times, (with the power off) 

This is a common problem with long time out of use 
electronic equipment A**®*!-.. 
ffiAbe'i " ' 

Thanks for the clues. I agree that the problem is not 
the OS 8.6 now that I hear mat it works on OS 8.5 on a 
Mac 6100. But, it takes an early version of MacWrite II or 
earlier and it takes a Mac with a separate serial port for an 
external modem. 

The Mac PBG3 of my vintage seems to have just one 
combination phoneVprirrter port and apparently the Z88 to 
Mac software never had to deal with that. It remains for 
me to find a way to get the combo port to split into two - 
one phone and one printer? Or perhaps Apple has a system 
patch that lets me switch which one is in play when I want 
to Z88 to talk? I am not sure that Apple ever does that sort 
of thing? Regards, 

Richard R. Tryon 

rtryon@bignetnorfli.net 

Hello, 

Sorry for my English. Have you a ZX8 1 to 
order for me? Or can you order a ZX81 from Zebra System 
please. I live in Germany. My address is: 

Uwe Schonewolf 
Liegnitzer Str. 1 
Germany - 34123 Kassel 
Thanks for message. Uwe Schonewolf 

U.Schoenewoli^Web.de 
I wrote Zebra System, waiting on reply, Abed 

Union City Man Conveys 
His love for Computers 

By Kenneth Lim Correspondent 
UNION CITY -- Today marks the 20th anniversary of the 
IBM personal computer, but when Tim Swenson chose his 
first computer in 198 1, the IBM never entered his rnind. 

"The IBMs were too expensive. I could choose 
between the Vic-20, Tandy or Apple," Swenson said, 
recalling the computer brands from his high school days. 
"Then I saw the Sinclair ZX81, which was only $200, and 
I knew that was what I wanted." 

"Although the IBM and its clones marked a new 
phase in home computing, the IBM was not the first home 
computer. Few now recognize the Sinclair computers, and 
even fewer own and use Sinclairs. 

Swenson, 37, is a collector of vintage computers - 
computers that no longer are manufactured. His collection 
includes an almost-complete series of the Sinclair 
computers, produced from 1979 to 1988. 

Swenson also has many other old computers and 
peripherals, including a Commodore 64, an Atari and 
software cartridges that were popular with computer users 
in the late 1 970s and '80s. 

While many of those users have replaced their old 
machines with newer, fester and more powerful ones, 
Swenson has kept a special place in his heart - and his 
garage — for the Sinclairs. 



Sharing a table with an Internet-enabled PC is the 
"pre-Web" Sinclair QL, a 1986 model that Swenson 
occasionally uses to write computer programs. 

Between those computers sits Swenson's favorite - 
an "updated" QL model called Q40 with a processing 
speed of about 40 megahertz, about 25 times slower than 
today's 1 -gigahertz PCs. 

Swenson also has a Z88, a laptop-sized precursor to 
the palm-sized personal digital assistants, which Swenson 
prefers to heavier laptops. 

"It doesn't take forever to boot up," Swenson said as 
the machine came alive after he inserted four AA batteries. 
Using laptops, rfs a problem with different electrical 
systems overseas," he added. "But anywhere you go, you 
can get AA batteries. " 

Swenson, who is vice president of the Union City 
Historical Museum, knows the history of every one of his 
Smclairs. He also used to write a newsletter for the QL - 
"The QL Hacker's Journal" ~ that he distributed to other 
QL fens he knew. 

Swenson, who will exhibit his Sinclairs at San Jose's 
Vintage Computer Festival next month, said he first saw a 
vintage computer collection at a computer festival in 1989 
and was inspired to start his own. He estimates that only 
about 30 people still use Sinclairs in the United States, but 
there are 60 or 70 in Britain, where the Sinclairs were first 
produced. 

Compared with current off-the-shelf PCs that are 
used for almost any purpose in homes and offices, 
Swenson said high-priced home computers in the early 
1980s were used mainly by hobbyists for prograrrirning. 

But now those computers usually are not expensive. 
Flea markets and Ham festivals - electronic flea markets 
organized by amateur radio operators - were good places 
to find old computers, Swenson said. Most owners were 
happy to get rid of their old computers when they got 
newer ones. 

"I remember I had a neighbor with an old Mattel 
Aquarius and I offered her $10 for it," Swenson said. "She 
had to choose between a computer she didn't use and $10. 
It didn't take her long." 

Much harder to find are the computer parts, which 
often no longer are sold. So the thought of damages 
worries Swenson. 

"Once I was in my car ... it slipped down an 
embankment and hit a redwood tree," Swenson 
remembers. "The first thing in my mind was 'Is the Sinclair 
all right?' 

"I can get replacement parts for myself in the 
hospital, but I don't have any for the Sinclair." 

For Swenson, collecting vintage computers is similar 
to other hobbies — such as coUecting records or old cars. 
These computers can still be used, if s just what you use 
them for," he said. "I use my PC when I need the Internet, 
but when I'm prograrmning I still enjoy the QL." 

Nostalgia is an important part of the hobby. 
"Many collectors are hitting their 20s and 30s, and many 
of them miss the old games and systems they used as 
kids," Swenson said. 

Then there is the pride factor. "Sometimes people tell me 
their first computer was a 386," Swenson said, referring to 
a 1985 processor for the PC. "I was there before that. " 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



6 



Autumn 2001 



ZX96 - A Professional System Based On The ZX81 



ZX96 Main board. 

ZX96- Giant memory 
expansion* 
Bus driver board. 
Floppy disk controller. 
Multi-IO-board. 
AT-keyboard IF 
LCD-controller. 
Hard disk-IF. 
Megabyte board. 
Memory map. 
Hie following noticeable 
advantages to the original ZX81 are 
present in the ZX96 System: 

1. Contact-secure bus system (DIN 
41612, 64 Pins) . 

2. A regular standard AT computer 
keyboard. 

3. Memory expansion possible when more memory is 
required 

4. A modem mass storage concept (floppy disk and fixed 
disk) . 

5. Inst ead of a TV a LCD screen can be used. 

6. Multiple VO ports (parallel/serial). 

A look inside reveals the amount of work spent on the 
system. 

The base of the system is the ZX81 or ZX96 which is 
enhanced by the Giant-Expansion and the Poke Board. It is 
connected to the internal bus using a Driver Board. This 
unit allows for the connection of a ZX81 compatible matrix 
keyboard, a monitor and a cassette recorder. 
A View of the ZX96 main module with the ZX-PCB, the 
Giant and Driver additions. 

The first expansion is a Floppy controller for single- 
sided 80 Track 3.5" Floppy Drives. (160KB capacity per 
floppy disk). 

An AT keyboard can be connected to a special Interface, 
which also includes an additional video output as well as a 
TV modulator. (The modulator was originally placed on the 
Poke Board, but had to be removed to allow for more board 
space.) 

Ail I/O ports are present on the Multi-IO Board: 
Centronics, RS-232 and four additional ports with user 
programmable baud rates. 

If the 144 KB of memory on the Giant Board are not 
enough, Megabyte Board can allow for expansion up to an 
additional 4 megabyte of static RAM. 

The LCD screen is controlled by a custom LCD- 
Interface, which offers additional possibilities: because 
mere is space left on the edge areas of the display screen, 
these are as can be used for displaying system status 
information. 

The Hard disk Interface can be used to control a 
regular IDE Fixed Disk Drive. A comfortable special DOS 
called MEFISDOS with a full-screen editor leaves very 





IMS 



:* 



. :.'3 

7*iS - '■ 



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I 



*i. ■ '• ' " ■% A 



ijlillilSl 
r 



little to be desired 

Finally a more in-depth view of the ZX96, as in the 
back of the picture the Backplane Board is situated 

We have professional PCBs for ail of the above 
extensions in a really good quality (160x100mm). Please 
have a look at the price list, 07/01 

Kai Fischer 
Raumer Str. 2B 
D-09366 Beutha, Germany 
www.2x81.de kai@zx8I.de 

You've been invited to join the TS2068 group, an email 
group hosted by Yahoo! Groups, a free, easy-to-use email 

group service. 

By joining TS2068, you will be able to exchange messages 
with other group members. Yahoo! Groups also makes it 
easy to store photos and files, coordinate even TS and more. 
Here's an introductory message from the group moderator: 
Hello fellow Timex Sinclair 2068 hackers, Welcome to the 

TS2068 group on the Yahoo Groups service. This is a 
reincarnation of the 2068@unixville.com list that used to 
exist before April 2001. 
To learn more about the TS2068 group, please visit 
http://groups.yahoo.com'group/TS2068 -or- 
http ://www.timexsinclair. org/ 
To start sending messages to members of this group, simply 
send email to TS2068@yahoogroups.com 
If you do not wish to belong to TS2068, you may 
unsubscribe by sending an email to TS2068- 

unsubscribe@yahoogroups. com 
To see and modify all of your groups, go to 
http:/7groups.yahoo.com/mygroups. Regards, 
Louis Florit 
Moderator, TS2068 
Y our use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to 
http ://docs. yahoo, com/info/terms/ 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



7 



Autumn 2001 



Sirutmi" SuparEEsiB 3.3.3 



Structured SuperBasic (SSB) is a program that 
takes SuperBasic programs written in the SSB 
style and converts them to full running 
SuperBasic programs. 
Structured SuperBasic supports the following features: 

- No Line Numbers 

- Blank Lines Between Lines of Code 

- Labels for GOTO's and GOSUB's 

- Conditional Compilation (#IFDEF) 

- Multiple Part Programs (#INCLUDE) 
Structured SuperBasic programs are written in any text 
editor and converted with the SSB program. 

r*wm lthough Structured SuperBasic does add one extra 
L^H step in going from writing code to a rurmable 
|l program, it does give the programmer lots of extra 
features to make the programming process more 
structured. No line numbers and blank lines between code 
allows for an easier reading program. #INCLUDE 
statements allow the code to be broken up into smaller 
pieces and allows code reuse. No line numbers means that 
software management utilities, such as the Resource 
Control System (RCS) is easier to use. 
r-wdded to SSB 2.6.1 is a second command line 
\Jm argument of Starring Line number. This allows 
I H SSB to use used with the Unix utility Make (Make 
comes with the C68 distribution). Also added is 
SSBGO, a utility that automatically runs SSB, load the 
program into SuperBasic, and calls Qliberator to compile 
the program. Designed to be used inside MicroEmacs, it 
can be used with any multitasking editor (just CTRL-C to 
SuperBasic and EXEC ssbgo). 

m jersion 2.6.2 fixes a few bugs in 2.6.1 and does not 
^ladd any ne w features. 



Structured SuperBasic is a freeware program. It was 
compiled with Qliberator 3.36 and requires TKII. It 
is configurable with CONFIG and with Environment 
Variables (ENVJ3IN). 
ssb262.zip(44K) 



FilaCcFifig 



FileConfig is based on O. Fink's BasConfig program and 
automates its use. With BasConfig, you have to enter all 
of the Config Block information by hand. Make a mistake 
and you have to start all over again. Want to change a 
Config Block definition? With BasConfig you have to 
totally recreate it. 

FileConfig uses a Config Block Definition file. 
Once you create the file, just run FileConfig and 
your Config Block is created. If you need to 
change the structure of the Config Block, just edit 
the Definition file, rerun FileConfig and the new, updated, 
Config Block is created. 
filecfe.zip Q6K ) 



« ynx is an HTML (web) browser, ported to the QL 
M by Jonathan Hudson. On the QL Lynx is only 

capable of looking at local files (no Net access). 

This archive is a minimal installation of Lynx and 
will fit onto a single 720K floppy. I've written up a short 
"How To Use Lynx" article to get you going. This version 
will run on a QL with a Gold Card. 
lvnx.zip (281K) 



The Trials and Tribulations of Reading 
an MSDOS Text File Disk I 



Richard Matejovic 



This is from the January/February 1990 issue of 
CRAGIST newsletter. I was in correspondence with 
Richard for a while and all at once he dropped from 
sight and my letters to him were returned forwarding 
address not given . I never did learn what happened to 
Richard. What follows is what he sent me. 

Before I begin I would like to thank Bill Miller of 
SINKLINK for getting me involved with this project 
in the first place. I would also like to thank Mark 
Wahl also of SINCLINK C for writing the initial program 
that I used to get started in the right direction All I really 
did was debug Mark 1 8 program . 

Our story begins some time ago in a land tar away 
(Ohio). One day I was talking to Bill on the phone 
(Much to my wife' s dismay! ) I was telling him that I 
had just gotten an AERCO disk drive System for my TS- 



1000! After having had only cassette and stringy floppy 
this was new and ponderous for my poor little person to 
behold. In the course of our conversation Bill mentioned 
that I should try to read an MSDOS disk. He said that his 
system could read other disk made on other machines. So I 
thought sure I am game to give it a try. Well Bill sent me a 
diskto try. I also sent him one to try. 
flft fter playing around with this project on my own I had 
Wall but given up. By reading the AERCO manual and 
■Wots of trial and error (lots of error) I was able to 
determine that this was going to require some Machine 
Code progranrming skills. Since this was beyond my 
abilities, I thought "I will call Bill and see if he can be of 
any help!" Well Bill wasn't but he asked Mark about it and 
in a matter of a few minutes he was able to pound out a 
short program that he thought would work. However, since 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



8 



Autumn 2UQT 



he had no TS-1 000 to try it on, back it came to me. I typed 
in the program and tried it. No go, nothing happened. The 
screen went blank and that was it. OK, I know the drive 
needs to be started. So I added line "700 RAND USR 
12800". Now lets RUN the program, CRASH with error 
code "3/1100 subscript out of range". OK lets call Bill 
again. Unfortunately he was not much help. After some 
more playing around with Ihe program I changed line 1000 
to "FOR K=l TO 40". It WORKED! ! 

All right lets see what all is on this disk. After 1 sector 
error 3/1100 AGAIN ! OK now variable "N" needs 
reset so add line "1085 IF N=SEND THEN GOTO 
1 160". And we were off again. This time it made 9 sectors 
before error 3/1 100. I don' t know about you but I was 
getting tired of the same error all of the time. The least it 
could do is come with something new! Anyway now 
variable "S" needs reset so add line "1015 IF S>9 THEN 
LETS=1". 

This brings us to where the program is today. It will still 
crash out with error 3/1100 when it comes across 
anything but text files, but I am working on this 
problem also. In the mean time if you do use it and it 
crashes just type in "PRINT PEEK K," and "PRINT PEEK 
S;" and avoid these areas . 

I would like to thank you for the time you have taken to 
read this article. You can be sure that I will be typing 
away on my little toy computers for many years to come . 

By the way if you are using a MemoTech Centronics 
Printer Interlace then you should reverse lines 940 
and 960. 

NOTE: The lower case letters in the listing are 
inverse lettered. 

7 0 PRINT 

8 0 PRINT 

90 PRINT "WARNING warning 



■~>tr 



WARN INC 

95 PRINT 

100 PRINT "THIS PROGRAM WILL 
CRASH" 

110 PRINT "IF YOU DO NOT SET RAM 
TOP BY" 

120 PRINT "POKE 1638 9, 1.92 THEN 
NEW" 

130 PRINT "PRESS ENTER IF YOU 
HAVE DONE SO" 

14 0 PRINT 

15 0 PRINT 

160 PRINT "TO STOP THE PRINTOUT 
PRESS BREAK" 

18 0 PRINT "TO STOP THE DISK 
DRIVE TYPE IN" 

190 PRINT """USR 12852" "WITE IT 
DOWN" 

200 INPUT Z$ 

700 RAND USR 12800 

800 LET MCADDR=32*1024-512-11 

810 LET M=MCADDR 

820 REM LD HL, $7E00 

821 POKE M, 33 



ft 



822 POKE M+l, 0 

823 POKE M+2, 126 

830 REM LD,C. $0 

831 POKE M+3, 14 

832 POKE M+4, 0 

840 REM LD B, $0 

841 POKE M+5, 6 

842 POKE M+6, 0 

850 REM CALL $3300 

851 POKE M+7, 205 

852 POKE M+8, 0 

853 POKE M+9, 51 
8 60 REM RET 
8 61 POKE M+10, 201 
900 DIM T$(256) 
905 DIM A(512) 
910 FOR N=l TO 32 
920 LET T$(33 TO 47)="? 

?$??, ()*+,-•/" 

930 LET T$ (48 TO 
64) ="012345678 9: ;"<>?" 

938 REM TYPE LINE BELOW THIS 

939 REM IN INVERSE VIDEO 

940 LET T$(65 TO 
90 ) ="abcdef ghi j klmnopqrstuvwxyz" 

950 LET T$(91 TO 96)="???? 

960 LET T$(97 TO 
122) ="ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ 

97 0 FOR N=123 TO 256 
980 LET T$(N)=" " 
990 NEXT N 
1000 FOR K=l TO 40 
1.0.10 FOR S=l TO 9 
10.15 IF S>9 THEN LET S=l 
1020 CLS 

1030 POKE (MCADDR+4), S 

1040 POKE (MCADDR+6), K 

1050 RAND USR MCADDR 

10 60 LET SSTRT+MCADDR+11 

1070 LET SEND=SSTRT+512 

1080 FOR N+SSTRT TO SEND 

1085 IF N=SEND THEN GOTO 1160 

1090 LET A=PEEK (N) 

1100 LPRINT T$(A); 

1110 NEXT N 

1160 NEXT S 

1170 NEXT K 

1180 STOP 

Note: 

In line 1050, the listing of the program I have is 
"1050 RAN USR MCADDR" RAN could be either RAND 
or RUN but since USR usually follows RAND I selected 
that. Not having an AERCO TS-1 000 disk drive interface 
that worked I could never try his program. 

Donald S. Lambert 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



Autumn 2001 



by Darko Stanbb 



ZXSpectrum.rtf VI. 0 (International) 

The Font This font is based on the Sinclair ZX 
Spectrum ROM character set and if s 8x8 grid. It is 
released as healthware, which means that if you use 
it, you will live through a happy and joyful rife. (Like the 
joke about milk - Why is milk healthy? If you drink it for 
1200 months, youll live for 100 years ;) No money, no 
postcards, no email, no fuss at all. Just use it for everything 
you want, sell it as your own work of art :)) change it as 
you like, anything. But than again, if you ever print it in a 
magazine or do something useful with it, I'd love to see 
that... if it is no bother to you, send me a scan or just email 
to let me know - darone@sezampro.yu. 

The Story At first, I wanted to make only 1 10 original 
characters of the char set. Than I realized that I really 
*needed* our 10 national characters in it, and the rest 
was easy... ;) The Characters it supports several Unicode 
ranges (according to Microsoft Font Properties extension 
for Windows 95): 
Basic Latin Latin- 1 
Supplement Latin Extended-A 
Basic Greek Cyrillic 

and more than a few Code pages 
1252 Latin 1 1250 Latin 2: 
East Europe 1251 
Cyrillic 1253 
Greek 1254 
Turkish 1257 
Windows Baltic 
Windows OEM Character Set 
869 IBM 
Greek 866 
MS-DOS 
Russian 865 



MS-DOS 

Canadian French 861 
MS-DOS Icelandic 860 
MS-DOS Portuguese 857 
MS-DOS IBM 
Turkish 855 
IBM Cyrillic; 
Primarily Russian 852 
Latin 2 775 
MS-DOS Baltic 737 
G 850 WE/Latin 1 437 US 
'm not very experienced in foreign characters and there's 
a big possibility that I made some of the chars ugly or 
mistaken, so if you notice something bad, some pixel 
missed or added or even a whole character wrong,, please 
email me. (I didn't even proof test the font in the real 
world until now and I noticed that I don't like zcaron - one 
of the 10 chars that made me do the whole job! So there's 
certainly gonna be another version, but not very soon - say, 
with 1 0 or 20 chars to edit?) 

There are 652 glyphs in it, even ff, fL, ffi and ffl 
ligatures - eveiything I found around, and it is 
nowhere near kern (big thanks to Emigre, for 
inspiring my life and sending me free posters). There are 
no italic or bold versions so far, but I am thinking of the 
bold version (ROR, OR A, if anyone remembers... there 
will be some really cool characters in it!)- Thanks I'd like 
to thank Bojan Stojanovic for some essential info on how 
to set up Fontographer, and Dragan Petrovic for digging 
my Spectrum cassettes out of the dust. I'd also like to thank 
Sir Clive Sinclair for creating the best computer ever (at 
least in my heart). Darone 

lonQ Hue spemtr-LJrTi 



A Proposal for the Creation of a True Type Font for 
Documenting and Archiving of Sinclair Program Listing 

David Solly 



The IFroblem 

?n few weeks ago one of my Timex/Sinclair utilities 
diA decided that it would no longer load so I found myself 
having to retype the program from a copy of the line-list. I 
was lucky to have made a hard copy using my Alphacom 
thermal printer, however, I went to fetch it I found to 
my horror - that the paper had gone so dark that the listing 
was almost unreadable. The edges of the paper had turned 
brown and were beginning to crumble. The problem is 
that thermal paper, because of its high acid and metal 
content, is subject to a phenomenon known to archivists as 
"slow fire" which causes the paper to quite literally to burn 
up within only a few years. I realized that I would have to 
do something if I was to have any hope of preserving my 
line-lists. 



The Solution & SSome ISIistory 

Cqp3 he obvious solution to the problem would seem to be 
ii simply to reprint each line-list on acid-free paper 
using a full-sized printer. The catch is, however, that there 
are still the Hi- ASCII characters from character 128 to 
character 164, which represent the Sinclair block graphics 
and the user defined graphics (UDGs), to contend with. 
Most publishers during the heydays of the ZX Spectrum 
and Timex/Sinclaii 2068 in thel980s were content to 
publish photocopied images of the line-lists as they came 
from the Alphacom printer. Although this method created 
an accurate reproduction of any graphic characters in the 
progr am listing, the quality of the print y which was either 
light or skewed to the left or right y made reading and 
keying difficult. A few publishers opted to use set type 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



TO" 



Autumn 2001 



and substitute the graphic characters in the line-lists with 
"codes". These "codes" tended to be confusing and as 
difficult to read because there was no true one-to-one 
relationship between the "code" and the graphic character 
it represented. 



T 



The Proposal 

oday, it must be possible to create a suitable True 
Type font for the purpose of documenting and 
archiving Sinclair BASIC program line-lists. I have 
already tested a few "Sinclair" fonts that attempt to 
emulate the 8 by 8 pixel typeface one sees on the 
actual computer. These proved to be unsatisfactory 
for my needs mostly because the Sinclair Hi-ASCII 
graphic characters were not properly represented. 
What I would like to see is a full-fledged mono-space 
font with proper representation of the Sinclair 
Hi-ASCn. 

TkW y choice would be to base the font on OCR- A but 
MLt any ottier clear mono-spaced font such as OCR-B or 
Lucia Consul would be suitable. The block graphics from 
character 1 28 to 1 43 can be represented as they are and 



where they are in the ASCII sequence. I would add a 
border around each block graphic for the purpose of 
line-listing to make it easier to distinguish what each block 
graphic is. I don't see why the UDGs could not be 
represented by "A" through "U" enclosed in a box. This 
would signal that the character in question is a user denned 
graphic and indicate on which key it is found. As for what 
sections of the line-list that may be printed in inverse print, 

I don't see where that would be much of a problem with 
today's word processors. One could either "bold" or 
"highlight' ' these sections of the list. However, if an 
inversed character set were to be included in the package, 
that would be a definite bonus. 

The (Soncluskw 

Y? am hoping that someone here who has the skill 

II and the software to create such a font might do so 
and make it available to all of us who have a need to 
document and archive his or her Sinclair (BASIC) 
program line-lists. Thank you kindly. 

k_david_solly@hotmail.com 



Creating Your Own TS-2068 Character Set 



One of the features that made me get my 
206d was the possibility of changing the 
character set. But, it didn't seem to be 
worth the trouble until I saw the special 
alphabet used in a program that was shown 
at a recent TUG meeting. As you can see in 
the listing of CHRS, it is well worth it 
in better legibility, and it's prettier 
too. 

I really enjoy making character sets 
with this program which can be used to 
asake more than just one regular and one 
USR set by changing the values of S and T 
which are the beginning of the second 
character set and tJDG set respectively. 

After you type in the program and KJN 
it you can start out by copying the 
Sinclair character set and then changing 
it. Sets can also be saved as bytes for 
use in other programs. Line 6000 switches 
the computer back into the normal ROM 
characters while line 6010 puts the new 
ones into use, 





row itsys 3: 1 



S ENTER ESC: *t 



768 GO SUB 953*. LET H=5+S* <CHP- 
32 * 

718 FOR 1=1 TO 8: LET HH=F££K < 
H+I~l> 

712 FOP jsi TO * , , 

728 IF HH>=fl<J> THEN LET HH=HH~ 

fi<J> : LET S*<X,J»±"S" 
738 NEXT J 5 NEXT I 
798 GO TO 2888 _ a 

958 DIM 5$<8,8>: FOR I; TO 8s 

LET S*il>=" "i NEXT Xi P.E 

TURN 

988 P RINT PiT 14,12; FLhSH ij/'Sl 

ri rangrai "! fop i=s to 767; poke q 

+X> ,PEEK U5616+I>: NEXT Ii LET 

U-8s GO TO 1888 
999 ON EPP. RESET : OVER 81 BEEP 
0.87,311 BEEP 8.87,28; PSPER ?; 
INK 9: BRIGHT Q; BORDER S i STfcP 

1818 PRINT ftT Y*3,X+7jS$ <Y,X> 5 P 
ETUPN 

1888 ON ERR RESET % BORDER is P* 
PEP li INK 9; CLS S POKE 23658,1 
1818 PRINT ST 5,8; ; GO SUB 5588; 
2828 PRINT ftT 19,2; "V CO p? Sine 1 
air set *"* :st©fs"; «T 2i,4;'*!il 
0 34 CHR* ".'save CHR* M 
1848 DIM C$<l>i INPUT J TfiE 18j"C 

1842 IF C$= ,, ** 4 THEN CO TO 7898 
1844 IF C$=**V THEN IF U = i THEN 
GO TO 960 

1346 IF C*= , *J" THEN GO TO 7188 

THEN COPY 



1348 IF C*: 



OR C$=" 



THEN 



GO 



1858 IF 
TO 999 

1368 LET CHR-CGDE C* ^ 
1878 IF CHR>143 RNC CHR<185 THEN 

GO TO 888 
1888 IF CHR>32 RNO CHR<127 THEN 
GO TO ?88 
1988 GO TO 1888 

2988 OVER 8; BORDER 6 1 PAPER *'> 
BRIGHT 8! CLS *, INK 9; PAPER 8i 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



11 



Autumn 2001 



■]'.::':. Th&. : character ; editor ; routine: : 
by pressing a character yon wish, to 
change. While in. the edit mocie< use tiifc- 
arrotf • Keys to move the dots aroundi Press 
1 to plot/ press 0 to unplot, press 4 to 
■return' to " 'the' menu, a«4 press© eoter to 
POKB the hew character. : '. . . . ■ 
: : : don't thiiilc- you ■ will ■ ever be. : . : conteht 
: With. : just ; the ■ Old : alphabet ■ again • 

: :aa : John • MOnfcUS 



JGHN- 



19 REM CHRj 

.. . jpt JjJT jn^ .. 

:tS«. fclM « «a » :r ■:RC5T0RC---:"-P0R : lit 

to 8$ ■■R»w:-fl^i? : i :: n£kt::^;:;::; : ::;: 

.■■aS: DhTS 128^4,32, 1B,«,4, 2,1 
4w LET &==6468S<i iET T=653§«? i 

et 'U"ai;;. 

188 8 0 ■ TU 179© 

688 : m: WB. ' : 9S8i : LET " H iT : *8* ; <€HR - 
■ 144> J CO TO 718 

7838 POKE 23824,41 i DIH T*<18.>: 
INPUT 5**18 €HR$ wax • 4 =£§€.> ";U£: 

If u*r"4" THEN GO TO 1380 
7032 IF U*='*" THEN LET T$-«* CM 
p : $ »': GO TO 7836 

7334 LET T$=L'$ _ ^ . „ 

7838 FOR 1 = 1 TO 10; IF CODE T$<I 
► ?>32 AND CODE T*<I>>47 ftNO CODE 
'T$<I><58 THEN CO TO 7610 
7933 NEXT I 
7944 LET J=6553S-S 
7956 SAVE T*C0f>£ 5 ,J 
7868 LET R=I8885 ON ERR GO TO 79 
59: PRINT AT 9,0;" "J FLASH 

T'"PE»IND T3PE TO VERI FY*'; FL£S 

AT 11,115 PRPER 85 INK 8j 0 

^IIs^RINT ST 19,95 5 VERIFY ""CO 

DE : GO TO 1889 
7899 STOP 

?f$0 REM a.laMSSS&uis'^l 

7118 PflPER 2 5 INK 6; BORDER 2 « C 

■fflrtn LET ' R = i 888 SON ERR GO TO 79 
§8 

7148 PRINT f\J 18,8; ' LOAD ""CODE 



print b.t : a:*?*'!";! 1 ! 

::r.i:.:TC:..«:5.:.Pi?INT::.^T 



1+3 # 7 jT"! " J . R§P 



Sprint-: j»T"t a-; 



8s v r 



28 19 POKE 33858 ,8 5 
SUB 5888 



2288 



1 . . : PRPEP 7 5 " ■ i • P«P£ 

£SC;.4 : 



TP 



PS/'*; 8 .'"ENTER 
» ■ LET Y""4 

; pmmti : nap ***** 

INV ERSE 1 1 S* :< Y , X > 
2238: IF . INHEY$;t"6." 

THEN GC SOS 1 888 i 
2248 IF INKEY$:=^8" 
' THEN m ■•■ SUB . i 
2258 : 1'F : INKEY* ="7 4 * 

THEN GC SLiB 1888S 
2268 IF INKEY$ t^6" 

THEN GO SUB 1898 it 
2388 IF INKEYJ 
, 82,'44 t 
*j- - ' V ^ 3 ' "S> 
PLOT INVERSE 
i87*X>88-Y 



BRIGHT 1} 
XF X > 1 

* 

* ■ ■ 

* 

8 



.. i IF 

LET X->-il 
THEN: t . IF 
LET ' Y-rY:*t 
THEN .' t IF 
LET Y -Y*l 



,„;N 

LET ~S#fYvX>: : "PPTNT ft 



l5l7i*X,88>YS PLOT 



1388 

«15hT 8 



any Key 



7158 
7199 
7959 



GO TO 

STOP 

PRINT 



7; FLASH i;"0 
hT 1 ,2; FLASH 



95" press 
5 PAUSE 4E4 
7968 ON ERR RESET 
8939 STOP 
9888 REM 

9885 POKE 23658,8 5 P 
5 POKE 23876,255 
9818 CLS ! PRINT AT 
5 "DO NOT STOP TAPE" 
9828 LOAD ""CODE 
9838 GO TO 1888 

9998 STOP 

9999 PAPER 81 INK 9: 
,8; i SAVE "CHRi" LINE 9888 5 SAVE 

*• CHRi' CODE 64698 , 
"CW; PPINT AT 28,8;: 
CHR*"CODE 



GO TO R 

OKE 23875,88 
9,3; FLASH i 



PRINT AT 28 



936 i VERIFi 



VERIFY 



ULATORS 



Warajavo 



[ PC/DQS | PC/Windows j Unix | Amiga | Macintosh J 
Arnrn j Psion_3 j Psion 5 ) Windows CE i Playstation j 
Dreamcast i Atari 1 BeOS j Xj89 1 JJ92 \ ] 
For ail emulators (on all platforms), have a look in the 
emulators directory of the archive. 

vwvw.void.jump.org/emulators 
The following emulators can be had directly: 
PC/DOS (several supported by SGD): 
Notice that, although the emulators are written for DOS, 
they will ran in a DOS-box in Windows as well. 
280 version 4.00 (shareware) by Gerton Lunter 
(1,073,457 bytes) 

This archive contains versions for both DOS and 



Windows 3.1/95/98/NT [16/03/99] 

JPP (no longer updated) by Arnt Gulbrandsen 

(270,043 bytes) [30/09/97] 

Waraievo ZX Spectrum Emulator version 2.51 by 

Zeliko Juric and Samir Ribic (797,442 bytes) 

This emulator can handle the TZX file format! 

[21/12/98} 

X128 Soundblaster (169,918 bytes), or X128AdSib 

(167,909 bytes) version G.93 by James McKay 

You will need the ROMS (204,075 bytes) and 

DOS/4GW (144.016 bytes) to run it. 

This emulator can handle the TZX file format! 

[06/11/98] 



M.E.S.S version 0.36b officially from The MESS 

Home Page (1 ,071,356 bytes) 

Emulates ail Sinclair machines (including 

ZX80/ZX81) plus lots of other machines (such as the 

CPC, MSX or C64 ranges) 

it runs on nearly every OS - the download above is 

the PC version. [22/05/00] 

Spectrum version 0.99F by Pedro Gimeno (74,186 
bytes) [26/07/98] 

Spec version 1 .4w by Robin Edwards (1 1 0,1 45 
bytes) 

SpecX version 1 . 1 2 (1 91 ,942 bytes) 

This shareware version runs under Windows 95/NT 

and uses DirectX 5.0. [09/06/99] 

R80 version 0.30 by Raul Gomez Sanchez (454,160 

bytes) 

This emulator can handle the TZX file format and 
supports both the .DAT and .POK fiies created by 
SGD! [09/03/00] 

Spectre beta version 0.04 by Johan Andersson 
(138,676 bytes) [26/05/99] 
ZBOStealth Spectrum emulator version 0.452 by 
Koipakov Kiriil (418,192 bytes) [23/04/01] 
Spec256 version 1 .2 by Iniqo Ayo and David Goti 
(108,187 bytes) 

Emulates a Speccy with the added option to use 256 
colours in stead of 16! 

Games must be adjusted for this. Such adjusted titles 
can be had from the Download page at the Spec256 
home . [17/09/99] 

FJNSPE version 1 41 by Jussi Lahteenmaki (36,473 
bytes) [10/12/00] 

JASPE version 0001 1 8 beta by Juiio Fernandez 
Perez (110,405 bytes) 

There is a Spanish version available as well (111 .515 
bytes). [20/01/01] 

ZXSpectr version 3.0 by Cesar Hernandez Banc 
(1 ,096,329 bytes) 

The source code is available as well (413,339 bytes). 
[31/12/99] 

YaSE version 0.8a by Christian Hackbart (426,295 
bytes) [06/10/00] 

RealSpectrum beta release 10, version 0.80.22 by 
Ramsoft 

This is an emulator with accuracy never seen before! 
This emulator can handle the TZX file format (both 
read and write]) and supports the .POK files created 
by SGDI 

It comes in several versions, optimised for the 
several processor tvpes: 
AMD version (AMD K6, K6/2, K6-H! and Athlon: 
487,259 bytes), 

Pentium ll version (1686) (intei Pentium Pro, Pentium 
II, Pentium Hi and Celeron; 483,325 bytes) and 
Pentium version (Intel Pentium and Pentium MMX 

processors only; 494. 052 bytes) [27/03/01] 

V.~.i. ,a«U r>\r-~ +U jCj DHM fJtoc '*V*ifi «Q U,4 oc \ 

i uu wiii cuo-w i^Cj^i.c; u \& riwi-'i iiico (6wO, iOi7 Dyv&Sj 

The documentation for this emulator is available on- 
line, in both English and Italian. 
Sinbas version 1 3 by Pavel Napravnik (181,207 

bytes) 

Not strictly an emulator, but a Spectrum BASIC 



interpreter] [26/06/00] 

PC Windows 

The following emulators require MS Windows 
Z80 version 4.00 (shareware) by Gerton Lunter 
(1,073,457 bytes) 

This archive contains versions for both DCS and 
Windows 3.1/95/98/NT [16/03/99] 
ZX-32 version 1 ,03a by Vaqgelis Kapartzianis 
' (1,438,591 bytes) 

Get the latest patch (v1 .03.98.021 1 . 242,959 bytes) 
Get the latest beta (v2.0Q.Q4.Q4, 260,646 bytes) 
[05/04/00] 

This emulator can handle the TZX file format! 
It runs under MS Windows 95/NT [15/12/97] 
Multi-Machine version 1.30b by Paul Hodgson 
(1,167,905 bytes) 

Emulates ail Sinclair machines (including 

ZX80/ZX81) plus lots of other machines (such as the 

CPC, Tandy or MSX ranges) 

This emulator can handle the TZX file formatl 

It runs under MS Windows 95 and requires DirectX 

5.0. [18/06/98] 

ZX Plus version 0.23 by Mark Swinhoe and Justin 
Wood (163.877 bytes) 

This emulator runs under Windows 95/NT and uses 
DirectX 7.0. [13/11/99] 

ZX version 0.51 beta by Danieie Qrro (151,021 bytes) 
This Windows emulator is also available in its native 
Italian (152,687 bytes) [20/06/99! 
Speccyal version 0 72b by Stephane Schmitz 
(155,915 bytes) 

This emulator runs under Windows 95/NT and uses 
DirectX 5.0. [12/03/00] 

vbSpec version 1 20 by Chris Cowley (2,347,225 
bytes) 

This emulator has been entirely written in Visual 
Basic and is quite useable - a feat never done before! 
[15/05/00] 

SEM version 0.33 by Alexander Patrakov (577,293 
bytes) 

Available for Windows 95/98/NT/2000 [15/11/00] 
A patch was released that corrects problems with 
sound on old cards (1,978 bytes) [25/12/00] 
GLECK version 0.04 by Ignacio Burgueno 
(375,596 bytes), previously just named Spectrum 
Emulator. 

This emulator can handle the TZX and POK file 
formats! 

It runs under Windows 95 and up and uses DirectX. 
Both English and Spanish versions are available in 
the package. [03/05/01] 
Spectrum 128K version 3.05 by Nikoky Shalaev 
(196356 bytes) [31/03/99] 

Supports .TRD/.Z80/.SNA/.SLT/TAP and comes with 

English documentation file (thanks to Mac Custer) and 

additional loaders in the package . 

More additional loaders are available as well 

Also available is a patch that translates the entire interface 

to English. [14/05/00] 

The foil source is available too. 

ZX-Emui version 0.34 by Vladimir Yudin (1 43, 11 1 

bytes) [15/11/99] 



ZXir QLive Alive i 



13 



Autumn 2001 



Supports TRD/.Z80/.SNA/. FD! 

The documentation has been translated to English by 

Evgeny Barsky. 

Grimalovsky Alexander wrote a config editor for the 

emulator (50..876 bytes) [27/11/99] 

UKV version 1.2 fix#5 by Max Vasiiyev (based on the 

original v1.2 from K. Uglekov) (140,039 bytes) 

[05/06/00] 

Supports .Z80/.SNA/.TAP/.FD! and comes with a 
program to convert between FDI and ,TRD images 
The documentation has been translated to English by 
Andy Schraepel. Unix 

XZX version 3.0.1 (shareware) by Erik Kunze 

(396,280 bytes) [20/12/00] 

Needs the Contrib file (v2.8 1, 291,222 bytes) 

[03/02/01] 

This emulator can handle the TZX file format? 
Erik also has RPM and SRPM versions of this 
emulator available on his site. 
The package also contains utilities to work with TR- 
DOS file images. 

XZ80 version O.ld by fan Collier (93,703 bytes) 
[30/09/97] 

Spectemu version 0.94 by Iviikios Szeredi (188,901 
bytes) 

There are also pre-compiled versions available for 
Linux (230,733 bytes) and Solans 2.5 (SPARC) 
(184,934 bytes). 

This emulator can handle the TZX file format! 
[22/06/97] 

Fuse version 0.3.0 by Philip Kendall (178,452 bytes) 
[31/01/01] 

ZXSP version 0.4.2 by Gunter Woigk (159,700 bytes) 

Requires an X1 1 setup with OSS for sound. 

This is the source code distribution. Available as well 

is the binary distribution version 0.7.1 which also 

requires the QT library (eg. for KDE desktop) 

(41 9,277 bytes) [28/06/00] 

Amiga 

KGB version 1.3 by KGB support BBS (34,454 bytes) 
[30/08/97] 

Spectrum version 1.7 by Peter McGavin (167,303 
bytes) [30/09/9/ ] 

ZXAM version 2 0 bv Ton] Pomar (51 5.634 bvtes) 
[30/09/97] 

ZX-Spectrum version 4.71 by Jeroen Kwast 

(187,758 bytes) [30/09/97] 

Spectrum. I.28K emulator version 0.2 by Alberto 

Ordonez (103,333 bytes) [24/03/99] 

CBSpeccy version 6.25b by Code Busters (167,705 

bytes) 

it emulates a ZX-Spectrum 12SK and TR-DOS fiie 

system. 

[24/05/991 

ASp version 0.79 by )an Greenway (145,941 bytes) 

Comes with completely accurate speed, excellent 

sound and full multitasking! 

With fast 128K bank switching! 

Supports Retargettable (RTG) displays and rainbow 

graphics [16/04/01] Macintosh 

l*L.Ql Wi uuj 

ZXSP version 0.1.8 by Gunter Woigk (675.546 bytes) 

ZXir QLive Alive! 



This emulator is available in Linux flavour as we!!. 
[28/06/00] 

PowerSpectrum version 1 .0 by Bo Lindbergh 
(69,248 bytes) [30/09/97] 

Macintosh 

MacSpectacle version 1 9.7 by Gunter Woigk 

(414,755 bytes) [28/06/00] 

Also uses ZX Loader He made full source code 

(vl.9.2) available as well [28/06/00] 

ZXSP vershn 0.1.8 by Gunter Woigk (675,548 bytes) 

This emulator is available in Linux flavour as well. 

[28/06/00] 

PowerSpectrum version 1.0 by Bo Lindbergh 
(69,248- bytes) [30/09/97] 

Acorn RISC OS 
Z80Em version 1 .2 (shareware) by Warm Silence 
Software (56,458 bytes) [30/01/981 
!MZX version 1 10 by Graham WiHmott (87,534 
bytes) [30/09/97] 
Also download the bugfjx 

Sped 26 version 0.15 by Joe Keileh er (78,936 bytes) 
[13/04/00] 

The first free 128K emulator for the Acorn! 

Psion 3 

ZX Emui version 1.0 by Freeman (36,097 bytes) 
Runs on all of the Psion 3a, Psion 3c and Psion 3mx. 
[31/12/00] 

Psion 5 

Sinclair Spectrum Emulator version 4.0 by Palmtop 
BV (208,827 bytes) 

Supports the POK files created by SGD ! [22/1 1/99] 
Windows CE 

Sinclair Spectrum Emulator version 1.1 by Palmtop 
BV 

Supports the .POK files created by SGD! 
Available in the following formats" 

Paimslze P/PC with SH3 or MIPS chip (570,512 
bytes), 

Handheld H/PC (pro) with MIPS chip (585.812 bytes), 
Handheld H/PC (pro) wit h SH3 ch ip (627,327 bytes), 

Playstation 

Speculator version 0.9b by Gabriele Roncolaio 
(392, 1 20 bytes) [22/06/98] ~ 

Dreamcast 

DrearnSpsc version 0.0003 by Dreamcast Emulation 
(6,375,990 bytes) 

Comes with 200 games in the package. [10/01/01] 

Atari 

ZX Spectrum emulator version 2.07 by Christian 
Gandler (591,593 bytes) [30/09/97] 

BeOS 

BeZX , a port of XZX v2. 0.4, by Jens Mian (469,360 
bytes) [25/01/99] 

Beccv development preview release, by Max 
Gontcharov (74,805 bytes) [24/09/00] 

TI89 

Tezxas v-2.2, by Samir Ribic (205,647 bytes) 
[18/11/00] 

TI92 Plus 

Tezxas v2.2, by Samir Ribic (137,390 bytes) [18/1 1/0 



Auiuiiiii 200 1 



The Z88 Source Cock 



INTRODUCTION 

The Z88 Source Book is designed to be a good reference 
on the Z88, how to interface it with the world, how to do 
things with it, what products are/were available, and what 
dealers carry them. It is not designed to be a replacement 
for the Z88 User Guide, but as a supplement to it filling in 
areas not covered by the User Guide. 

This Source Book also comes with a number of 
utilities and files for the Z88 on QL or MS-DOS disks. 
Although the Z88 can interface with any computer with a 
serial port, these are two that I have chosen to focus on. 
Those who have interfaced the Z88 with other computers 
can submit the details so that they may be added to this 
book. All utilities that come with this book are either 
Shareware, Freeware, or Public Domain and may be freely 
distributed. 

The reason for this book comes from when I was a 
new Z88 owner and did not know how to get it to interface 
with any computers. I initially got some help from Dave 
Bennett, but still had to fumble a bit in the dark. The Z88 
documentation assumes that one purchased the QLirik, PC- 
Link, or Mae-Link software and cable and does not discuss 
the ways to transfer files to another computer. From my 
initial lack of knowledge came the idea for a Source Book 
to assist new (and old) Z88 users, including utilities to 
help. 

This book relies heavily on the work of others and 
their exploration of the Z88. A lot of the infoimation in 
this book comes from a variety of publications and people. 
I am indebted to both Dave Bennett and Frank Davis for 
providing the back issues of various newsletters. Below is 
a list of publications and persons from which/whom this 
book is indebted. 

Update Magazine, Z88 Fax News, PipeLine, Z88 
EPROM, Dave Bennett, Frank Davis, Phil Wheeler, Chris 
Fenn, and other contributors of Z88 articles to the various 
newsletters. 

Throughout this book I will reference various parts 
by their Radio Shack Part Number. I'm doing this not 
because I favor Radio Shack, but because Radio Shack is 
everywhere and the part number references a specific item. 
One last item, if you have not read the Z88 Manual all the 
way through, then I recommend it. In the tradition of other 
Sinclair documentation, the manual is full of good 
information, but it's hiding. A cursory reading of the 
manual will not reveal all of the neat tricks the Z88 can do. 

CONVENTIONS 

There are a number of keys on the Z88 that are not on 
other computers. Below is the convention of how they will 
be used in this book: 

[ ] - Square Key 
<> - Diamond Key 

msTCcy 

The Z88 started off as the "Pandora" project when Sir 
Give Sinclair sold off Sinclair Research Ltd. to Amstrad. 
It was first introduced in England in June of 1987. It 

ZXir QLive Alive! ~15 



was sometime in 1988 that the Z88 was introduced in the 
US, being sold by Cambridge North America. The market 
life of the Z88 was rather limited. After corning on strong 
in 1988, a number of vendors and magazines started 
folding around 1990. The official Z88 magazine, "Z88 
User", folded in 1989 after publishing for a year. 
Cambridge North America folded in 1990 after some 
rather complicated legal dealings. 

When the Z88 was introduced to the US, the reviews 
in computer magazines seemed to be fairly polarized. 
Either the reviewer loved the Z88 (like Stan Veit) or wrote 
it off completely. Most reviewers cited the fact that the 
Z88 was not MS-DOS compatible as being a large reason 
why it would not sell. Despite the reviews, the Z88 did 
sell fairly well to Macintosh users, who did not care about 
it not being MS-DOS compatible, and were used to paying 
the high price that some dealers were selling the Z88 for 

TITTERTAM TITS 

Multiple Columns 

Change the width of Column A with <>W to 40. Set 
a right margin of 38 with <>H. Goto Options with <>0. 
Set justify to Y. Set the page length to what you want. Set 
Header, Footer, and Bottom to 0 and Left to 2. 

Editing is more difficult with multiple columns, so 
99% of the editing is done with the text in column A. Any 
insertions and deletions of lines of text must use the 
commands oEIRC and OEDRC. <>N and the <>Y 
insert and delete in ALL columns. 

Now you are going to separate and move your text 
into column B. There will be a jagged line across the 
column where you previously set the page length. Now 
move the cursor one line past this marker. Type <>Z and 
then move to the end of the text with <> and Down Arrow., 
Type <>Z again. All the selected text will be highlighted 
on the screen. 

Press TAB to move your cursor to Column B and use 
the arrow keys to put the cursor where you want the moved 
text to start. Now type <>BM for Block Move. Your 
selected text will be moved to your cursor position. 

EDO T4SIC TIPS 

The Z88 Manual is very terse on how to program in BBC 
Basic. It discusses the commands, ftmctions, and operators 
of the language, but does not cover how to put these 
together to construct a program. For the experienced Basic 
programmer BBC Basic should be fairly familial'. For the 
novice, it is a more daunting task to put together a 
program. 

A full discussion of how to write a BBC Basic 
program is far beyond the scope of this book. One way to 
learn BBC Basic is to go over the Basic programs included 
with the Source Book. They should provide you with a 
fairly good set of examples of how to do various tasks in 
BBC Basic, There are a few books on BBC Basic: 
"Using BBC Basic", P.J. Cockerell, 1983, John Wiley and 
Sons (ISBN 
047190242X). 

"BASIC Programming on the BBC Microcomputer", Neil 

Autumn 2001 



& Pat Oyer, 1982, Prentice Hall. 

"BSC Basic Reference Manual for the Z88", D.J. 

Mounter 

The first two books were designed for the BBC Micro and 
some portions of the text will not apply to the Z88 version 
of BBC Basic. They are good starting points for the 
novice programmer. Optionally, a novice programmer 
could pick up a book on general Basic and translate the 
examples to BBC Basic. 

Star Commands 

There are some commands that are not documented in the 
Z88 User Manual that are covered in other Books. 
*CLI - Execute CLI Commands. 
10 *CLI #F - invokes the Filer. 
*DELETE - Delete Files. 

10 *DELETE pd/file - Deletes file in the pd subdirectory. 
*ERASE - Same as *DELETE. 

*REANME - Renames a file. Execute it just like 
*DELETE. 

*NAME - Assigns a name to a BASIC program. 

The VDU Command 

A number of less documented features of BBC Basic are 
accessed via the VDU command. The VDU command is 
almost equivalent to the CHR$ command. VDU X = 
CHR$(X). Using the command VDU 65 will print out the 
A character ( A = ASCII 65). The ASCII codes from 0-31 
and 127 will perform special tasks with the VDU 
command. Not all of these VDU commands are 
documented. 

Some of the VDU commands are documented in the BBC 
Basic book by P.J. Cockerell. Most do not apply to the 
Z88 since they are graphics commands. One is completely 
different than that used on the Z88. The following VDU 
commands are not used on the Z88. 
VDU 17 Color Control 

VDU 19 Actual color to logical color 
VDU 22 MODE Command 

VDU 23 Create User Defined. Characters 

(see below) 
VDU 26 Restore Default Windows 
VDU 28 Define Text or Scrolling Window 
VDU 30 HOME the Cursor 
VDU 31,x,y TAB (x, y) 

The following subsections document the known Z88 VDU 
commands. 

This includes screen controls, sound, and user defined 
graphics. 

Screen Centre! Cedes 



The Z88 has a number of codes that are used to control the 
screen and to print special characters (ones not on the 
keyboard). Remember VDU X is the same as CHR$(X). 



VDU 


8 


Move cursor Left 


VDU 


9 


Move cursor Right 


VDU 


10 


Move cursor Down 


VDU 


11 


Move cursor Up 


VDU 


1,32 


Three Dots 


VDU 


1,33 


Bell Symbol 


VDU 


1,39 


Backwards Apostrophe 


VDU 


1,42 


S guar e 


VDU 


1,43 


Diamond 


ZXir QLive Alive! 



16 



vnn 

V LJ'-J 


1 

_L 








qhi ft ^vmhol 


vnn 


1 
j. 


1 24 






UnTi rrhr S 1 -3sh 


VJJU 


i 
1 








DlUCK 


VJJU 


i 
l 


, c £ 'i 








vnn 


1 

X 


225 






xj l i i— x_ fj y ilu-'wj. 


VJJU 


1 
X 


oof; 






I dD O VJuXJCJ J- 


ViJU 


1 
X 


99*7 








vnu 


i 

JL 


228 






E^C Svmhol 


vnn 

V JJU 


1 

X 








i itJix Lt «»j V iLUw> W_L 


VDU 


1 

J- 


230 






Tndpx Svrnbol 


vnn 


1 

X 








T-Tol n q^rmHnl 

1 1 *u x. dj y ilUw 1 ^ -i_ 


vnn 


1 

i. 


f \S 






T ,P> Ft" (Yav Jrr nw 


V JJU 


i 

X 


711 1 
r J. 








vnn 

V JJU 


X 


, C. 








VT)TT 


X 








TTn K"piv At tow 


vnn 

VJJU 


1 

X 


944 








V.UU 


1 

X 


9 A R 








vnu 

V JJU 


1 

X 


t £. *± V 






Thir*V" flnwn A Trow 


VUU 


•J 

X ( 


7 HI 

t /L'i 1 






i i 1 X J\. U j-) X. *w^W 


VDU 


1 


,248 






Thin Left Arrow 


VDU 


1, 


,249 






Thin Right Arrow 


vnu 

VUU 


1 

X j 


9Sn 






T Vi i *n own Arr r\w 

1 X I X I X XJ UWI .1 X^X. i. kJW 


vnTT 

VJJU 


1 

X , 


9^1 
, i j i 








VJJU 


X j 


act f 


a 


J 


DU1U ^XXa..L Ctt— LcX O 


\/nn 

VJJU 


1 

X j 




\\ <-\tt 


) 


J.UUUlcO UUl. iDUl 


VHTT 
VUU 


1 

1 t 




"n" 

JJ 


) 


D LKJY4z> UXXC3 U ±. 3 $J .L a y 


VIJU 


1 

1 y 




WO " 

£ 


) 


T? 1 -r» c? V"\ iT^Vi ^ r ofi' Ayq 

r XcloU v^iicii- aL. L. c?x_ o 


vnTT 


1, 


ASC{ 




\ 
/ 


oi-JLyiiu tiiaiCiCtcjL^ 


VT"YTT 
VJJU 


1, 


ASC( 


IX 


\ 
) 


illvcl. LO L- 1 i C? 0^X^*311 


VJJU 


1, 


ASC( 


11 


) 


jL/iyyii o'wX vj x id xx ljili 


Top to 


Bottom 








VDU 


1, 


ASC( 


U T" 


) 


Small Characters 


VDU 


1, 


ASC( 


"U" 


) 


Underlines Characters 



ttey Cedes 

Sometimes it is necessary to know the codes that keys 
generate. To find out what codes a key press generates, 
enter the following program: 

10 PRINT "Hit Key or Combination"; 

20 Z$ = GET$ 

30 PRINT Z$,ASC(Z$) 

4 0 GOTO 20 
The Diamond <> Key acts like a CTRL key. 



Key 


Alone 


Shift Key 


Ctrl Key <> 


UP 


0, 255 


0, 251 


0, 247 


DN 


0, 254 


0, 250 


0, 24 6 


RT 


0, 253 


0, 249 


0, 245 


LT 


0, 252 


0, 248 


0, 244 



Other interesting codes: 

CTRL TAB 0, 194 

CTRL DEL 0, 195 

CTRL \ 28 

CTRL = 0, 0 

CTRL - 31 

CTRL ] 29 

CTRL x 96 

CTRL [ 27 

CTRL ENTER 0, 193 

line Graphics 



Autumn 2001 



3~ | 0™ h 



The Z88 is capable of producing "IBM style" line 
graphics. These are generated by VDU commands in the 
following form: 

VDU 1,ASC( W 2") ,ASC( V% *") , ASC < w char") 
where char is a letter in the range A to O. 
Here is an example program: 

10 Z«65 

20 REPEAT 

30 VDU l,ASCr2") , ASC P*") ,Z 

40 VDU 9 

50 Z=Z+1 

60 UNTIL Z=80 

Sound 

The Z88 is capable of limited sound. Variations can be 
made of the Z88's beep. Below are three examples to 
experiment with: 

VDU 1,52,33,38,34,34 

VDU 1,52,33,34,33,34 
VDU 1,52,33,40,33,33 

User Defined Characters 

The Z88 has the ability to have up to 64 user defined 
characters. Characters can be defined from CHR$(64), the 
@ symbol, to CHR$(127), ESC. They are defined in the 
following format: 

VDU 

i,138ASC'^"A$C"char'' t n0 t ni t n2,n3,n4,nB,n6,n7 

where char is the ASCII character that this new character 
is assigned to. nO through n7 are the decimal equivalents 
to the binary code defining the character. 

The characters are defined in a 6 column by 8 row 
matrix. The rows are defined by the numbers nl to n7 in 
downward sequence (n7 is the bottom row) and the 
columns are defined by the six lower bits of the binary 
form of these numbers (bit 0 is the right-most bit). It 
appears that the setting of the two highest bits is not 
important. 

Here is an example of a Smiley Face character: 
Binary Decimal 



0 0 0 
0 0 0 



110 
110 



0 0 0 0 0 0 

0 0 0 0 0 1 

0 0 0 0 0 1 

0 0 0 1 0 0 

0 0 0 0 1 1 

0 0 0 0 0 0 



1 1 

1 1 

0 0 

0 0 

0 0 

0 1 

1 0 
0 0 



27 
27 
0 
4 
4 
.17 
14 
0 



< — n0 



<— n7 



} — Blank Column for space between characters 

Printing HEX Values 

Using a tilde (~) with the ASC command in a print 
statement will print out the HEX value of the character 
being operated on. -ASC" A" will print out the HEX value 
of the character A (41). ASC"A"is65. 
PRINT "A", ASC'A", ~ASC W A" 
will produce: A 65 41 

B4SIC Inline Assembler 



BBC BASIC on the Z88 comes with an inline assembler 
built in. The variable P% is used as a program counter. 
The user must set P% to the desired start point for the 
machine code before invoking the assembler. The 
assembler can be invoked with the [ symbol on a single 
line. It is uninvoked by a ] on a single line. Below is a 
sample program: 

10 DIM code 100 

20 P% = code 

30 [ 

40 LD BC,50 
SO RET 
60 ] 

It is recommended that the user have a good knowledge of 
Z80 machine code programming before trying the 
assembler. Locking up your Z88 could cause it to do a 
hard reset (take it to a "virginal" blank state). 

A Hint on the OPENUP Command 
The command OPENUP (OPEN for UPdate) is a little odd 
ontheZ88. 

The typical syntax might be: 
10F% = OPENUP(F$) 
20 PRINT #F%,G$ 

But this will result in the current contents of F$ being 
overwritten, not appended. To OPEN for APPEND, you 
need to move the file pointer to the end of the file: 
10fy 0 = OPENUP(F$) 

20PTR#F%=EXT#F% 

30 PRINT #F%,G$ 
This will add G$ at the end of the file, instead of 
overwriting the existing contents. 

Reading the Serial Port 
Here is a short BASIC routine that demonstrates how to 
read the serial port. 

10 channel % = OPENINP:COM.O") 

20 BPUT# channel%,outputbyte%- set byte 

30 inputbyte%=BGET# channel % -read byte 

Testing the Speed of the 
Z88 in Basic 

Benchmark speed tests are standard ways of comparing 
different computers in relation with each other. I have 
converted one benchmark program from the QL to the 
Z88. It's a fairly simple prime number calculating 
program, originally written by Duane Parker to test out 
different compilers and languages on the QL. I use it here 
to compare the Z88 with the QL. 

The QL is known for having a slow display I ran the 
benchmark on both computers with the output of the 
program being displayed and not displayed. The key thing 
I found out from this test is that the Z88 does not suffer a 
slow down when outputting information to the display. 
The results for the Z88 were the same on both runs. 

The benchmark determines all of the prime numbers 
from 32767 to X, where X is less than 32767 and greater 
than 0. In the benchmark tests that I ran, I had the program 
determine the primes from 32767 to 29000. These were 
the same numbers used in earlier tests with the benchmark. 
Using the fastest Z88 and QL times, the Z88 ran the 
benchmark in 326 seconds and the QL in 229 seconds. 

This means that the QL is 1.4 times faster than the 
Z88. Considering that the QL is running a 68008 at 7 



ZXirQLive Alive! 



17 



Autumn 2001 



MHz and the Z88 is using a Z80 at 3 MHz, the Z88 does 
fairly well. 

The program is as follows: 

10 PRINT "Stop Calculations at what 
value less than 32767?" 
INPUT V 

P = 32767 DIV 100 
IF V>32767 OR V<0 THEN PRINT 
"INVALID": GOTO 10 
50 PRINT "Primes < 32767 & > ";V 
A$ = TIME$ 

FOR I = 32767 TO V STEP -2 
FOR J = 3 TO 191 STEP 2 

IF (I MOD J) = 0 THEN GOTO 140 
NEXT J 

IF (KP*100) THEN PRINT : P=P-1 
PRINT I;" "; 
NEXT I 
B$ = TIME$ 
PRINT A$ 
PRINT B$ 



20 
30 
40 



60 

70 

80 

90 

95 

100 

110 

140 

150 

160 

170 



CABLES 



The serial port is the primary way to get data into and out 
of the Z88. Below are cable diagrams for linking a number 
of computers, a modem, and a printer. 

Cable Making dints 

I have found through experience that a cable may not turn 
out the way I feel it should. When I first made my Z88 
cables, I used standard 9 wire cable ( about 3/8" wide). 
This was what I expected a cable to look like. Well, after 
using them for a few years, I found the cable too thick and 
unyielding to use. 

After some thinking, I remembered some serial 
cables that were built with phone wire. Phone wire is 
flexible and easy to use. Since I had a few extra phone 
cords miming around, I snipped off the RJ-11 jacks and 
soldered some 9-pin D ends and away I went. 

Phone cable comes in 4- (RJ-11), 6-, and 8-wire (RJ- 
45). For connections to other computers, I found 4 wire to 
be fine. For a printer or modem cable, you will need either 
6- or 8-wire, which may be harder to find. 

Also, make your cables plenty long. I thought I had 
made mine long enough, but I found out how wrong I was 
when I went to use them. The distance from the back of 
your computer to a space right next to it (for the Z88) is 
longer than you think. Be on the safe side and make them 
long. 

Cable Diagrams 



Z88 



Z88 



2 3 

3 2 

1-4 4-j 

I -5 5- I 

6 6 

7 7 

8 9 

9 8 



288 QL SER2 

2 3 

3 2 

1-4 4 

1-5 I 5 

6 I 6 

7 | 7 

1-8 i 8 

1-9 9 



Z88 



MAC 



2 5 

3 3 

■■ 5 i 

7 4 

8 i 

9 2 

Z88 PC DB25 

2 3 

3 2 

1-4 4-1 

I -5 5- I 

6 6-1 

7 7 | 

8 1 8-1 

i 

I 20 

Z88 PC DB9 

2 2 

3 3 

4- 1 1-7 

5- 1 1-8 
7 5 

9 g 

Another way to do it is to use the DB25 cable and a 25 pin 
to 9 pin adapter (on the PC end). These adapters are easy 
to find at most computer stores. 

Z88 Modem 

2 2 

3 3 

7 7 

5 20 

8 20 

9 20 

Here is an alternative modem onnection. 

Z88 Modem 

2 2 

3 3 

4 -1 

5 -I 

7 7 

8 -I 

9 -! 

To be continued 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



18 



Autumn 2001 



Place your ads here, it is FREE 



Please inform and/or update the Editor of any changes in your ad/s 



We have been a part of the Sinclair scene since 1 982, 
repairing ZX Spectrums for Sinclair Research in 
England. 

We provide Sales, Service, and Software for the 

QL, Spectrum, ZX-81 and Z88 

www.membersMpodxoii^escomputing/hes 1 .html 

E-Mail 74601.1535@compuserve.com 
Hours of Operation is Monday - Friday 1 300 hrs. to 21 00 
hrs. central time zone. 
Phone 210 661-4376 

Heme Electronics Service 

John R. Rish 

5222 Kazen Dr. 
San Antonio TX 78219 USA 

Pro llifjifnl Electronics 

323 SE 28th Ave. 
Portland, Oregon 97214 
503-232-3200 



Pro Act Consijltincs 

2660 N. Houghton Rd. 
Tucson, AZ 85749 
520-749-5395, fax 520-749-3626 
^ema^^groa^jn d^a^ . com> 

The John Oliger Co. 

11601 Widbey Dr. 
Cumberland IN 46229 
The John Oliger Floppy Disk System 
FOR THE TS-2068 

206S User Cartridge 
DISK BOARDS M A W & *B W 
2068 Parallel Printer Port 
2068/SPECTRUM Joystick Port 
DFh Mapped Universal I/O Port board 
User Manual only : $5. 00 (Read before you buy) 

joMgei^rniridspring.com 

NESQLUG 



New England Sinclair QL Users Group 

Ed Kingsley, Editor 
16 Highland Avenue 
Saugus MA 01906 
(781) 233-3671 EdK4@aoi.com 






& 

ARCHIVE Based QL Software 

QLerk - A complete financial program for the QL 
QLerk software (v3. 21 ) with tutorial $29 
QLerk manual $29 
QLerk software & manual $50 

DBEasy - A menu based database system 

DBEasy software (v1 .6) $24 
DBEasy upgrade from V1 . 5 $7 

DBProgs - A toolkit of ARCHIVE procedures 

DBProgs software (v1 .8) $18 
DBProgs upgrade from V1 .7 $7 

DBTutor - A general purpose learning program 

DBTutor software(v1 .5) $ 1 2 

Bill Cable 

Wood & Wind Computing 

RR3 BOX 92 
Cornish NH 03745 USA 
Phone (603) 675-2218 

ID c in i n c C u lb e $ 



Hardware & Software 
352 7 th Ave. 15 th Fir. 
New York, NY 10001 
Phone 212 631-7563 
Fax 212 947-5069 Voice mail pager 917 490-8407 
Domino.cubes@excelsior.net 

QL Hacker's Journal 

■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ 

Supporting All QL Programmers 

Timothy Swenson, Editor 

2455 Medallion Dr. 
Union City, CA 94587-1914 
swensontc@geocities. com 
http://www. geocities. com/SilconValley/Pines/5865/ 

QLAMBer $20 

QLuMSi $20 

SeekQL $10 

Upgrades $5 

914 Rio Vista Cir SW 
Albuquerque NM 87105 
(505)843-8414 



PLATYPUS 










'•^'> : >'<' : ' : fe- : ' :i: -l§g^^i 











ZXir QLive Alive! 



19 



Autumn 2001 




Peter Liebert-Adelt 
LUETZOW STR 3 
D-38102 BRAUNSCHWEIG 

GERMANY 
Email: p.liebert@t-online.de 
http://home.t-oiilme.deyhome/^.Uebert/zx-team.htm 
Amateur Radio: DK4BF@DB0FC.#MDS.DEU.EU 

Jccther M«rz Software 

SMSQIE for the QXL 
SMSQ/E for the Super GoldCard 

QL Games & Upgrades QL Applications 
ProWesS + Applications 

Jochen Merz Software 
Im stillen Winkel 12 
47169 Duisburg, Germany 
« 0203-50201 1 Fax 0203-50201 2 
Credit Cards accepted 
http://www.j-m-s.com/smsq/ 
e-mail smsq@j-m-s.com 

Items for the Timex\Sinclair Computer 

Timeworks Programming kit #1 For T/S 1000 & ZX81 $4.95 
Mindware Gulp Game Timex 1000 & Sinclair ZX81 $4.95 
Timex Horace & The Spiders for the 2068. $5.95 

Chess (16K RAM) qty 5 price $2.95 ea 
MC, VISA, American Express. Phone 717-748-1747 

Keith Electronics 

224 North Grove St 
Lock Haven, PA. 17745 

QL Today is published by Jochen Merz Software. The 
representative in Britain is Miracle Systems Ltd. who take 
subscriptions and do the distribution. 
English Office 
Miracle Systems Ltd. 
20 Mow Barton 
Yates, Bristol, UK BS17 5NF 
Editor 
Dilwyn Jones 
41 Bro Emrys 
Tal-Y-Bont, Bangor, Gwynedd, UK LL57 3YT 

Zebra Systems, Inc. 

122W26 th St Suite. 904 
New York, NY 10001 

Basics of Timex Sinclair 1500/1000 BASIC 
BASIC Basics for the Times/Sinclair 1500/1000 
The Ins and Outs of the Timex TS-1000 & ZX-81 
Computer Interfacing Technique in Science TS-1500/1000 



Sinclair Resources 



Keith Watson (AERCO & Z80 Emulator) 
41634 Amberly Dr. 
Mt. Clemens, Ml 48038 



RodGowen (RMG) 
14784 S Quail Grove Cir 



Surplus 



JOHN J SHEPARD II! 
281 130 th ST 
OGDEN IA 50212 
< jshepard@wccta.net > 
Mostly QL & TS-2068 



JACK BOATWRIGHT 
67325 FRYREAR RD 
BEND OR 97701 
< jboatno4@outlawnet.com > 
Mostly ZX-81/TS-1000 & TS-2068 



Software 



mm 

fief I oqelfcer i 

Just thought I would add something that you 
could put in the next edition of ZQA! I have been in 
contact with a few members of the club that live out 

here on the "left coast", and we all came to the 
agreement that it would be great if we could try to 
have a get together of Timex/Sindair users, I was 
thinking that it would be great if possibly one day we 
could have a T/SNUG get together, but for the time 
being I was trying to gauge the interest of people who 

live on the west coast or beyond who would be 
interested in participating in a get-together in the Bay 

area. Maybe you could just post this in the next 
edition and whomever was interested could reach me 

and let me know. 

Also, my address has changed so I will give you that for any 
updates you need to make, take care, 

Luke Perry 



3409 NE 62 nQ Ave. #187 
Vancouver, WA 98661 
Luke.Perry@twtelecom. com 



ZXir QLive Alive! 



20 



Autumn 2001